


moon dances over your good side

by fliptomybside



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-28
Updated: 2017-08-28
Packaged: 2018-12-20 18:22:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11926602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fliptomybside/pseuds/fliptomybside
Summary: Every full moon, Niall turns into a wolf. It's just a thing that happens.





	moon dances over your good side

**Author's Note:**

> this is totally outside of my wheelhouse, but I tried. thanks a million to [Mary](http://yslverse.tumblr.com) and [Hannah](http://harrybasquiat.tumblr.com) for reading this over for me. Title from Harry Styles' Two Ghosts, all remaining mistakes are mine, please don't let the real people that this is about see it, etc. etc.

It hits Niall in the back of the neck, sitting in the back of her stat II class, the ache deep in her bones that comes with every full moon. 

It’s hot, like it always is in Tennessee in September, and Niall can feel the sweat gathering at her temples. Her hair’s frizzing and her roots are dark and she’s pretty sure there’s a sweat stain the size of Texas covering the back of her gray t-shirt.

She shifts in her seat uncomfortably, thighs sticking to the plastic. The professor won’t stop clearing his throat. Niall’s kept a count, and he’s at over one hundred times, even though they’re only halfway through the fifty minutes. Louis keeps aggressively brushing bits from her eraser into Niall’s lap. 

“That time of the month?”

Louis voice can barely be categorized as a whisper, and Niall can feel herself blushing, blood racing to her cheeks. The guy in front of her glances back in her direction, lip curling slightly. 

_You don’t even know, buddy_ , Niall thinks, and she bites down on the inside of her mouth hard enough that she can taste blood, coppery and sharp. 

“You’re not coming,” Niall whispers, forcing herself to look over at Louis. 

Louis is smirking at her and twirling a pencil between her fingers. Her hair’s stick straight despite the humidity, and Niall lets her eyes catch, just for a second, on the thin curve of her lips and how she’s pretzeled into her desk. 

“You’ll invite me someday,” Louis says, still too loudly for the middle of a small lecture, even if they’re sitting toward the back. “It’s so much more fun when you have a partner.”

The guy in front of Niall sighs with annoyance, and his chair squeaks against the linoleum when he tries to move himself forward, away from a conversation that’s clearly made him uncomfortable.

“’s what you get for eavesdropping,” Niall mutters under her breath, but he doesn’t move. 

He probably didn’t hear her, but Niall’s pulse still speeds up, torn between wanting him to turn around and wanting to run from the confrontations and all the shitty things people have ever thought about her. 

She’s lost count of the number of times the professor’s cleared his throat, she realizes. 

-

The walk back to her apartment is stifling. Niall’s shirt’s glued to her back beneath her backpack, and her face feels gritty. Everything’s so still. There’s no breeze, and all she can hear are the cicadas, their buzzing hitting a fever pitch when she climbs up the steps to the front porch.

Her keys are hot when she digs them out of the front pocket of her cutoffs. She almost drops them, her hand’s so slick with sweat. She misses the lock on the first try, her knuckles stiff and slightly swollen. 

It’s hot even inside, and Niall hurries up the stairs, knees creaking, up and up to the third floor, and then the faded red door to her apartment. 

Her window unit’s wheezing loudly, and Niall’s skin feels too tight, everything feels like sensory overload—the noise, the heat, how small her one room apartment is. 

It’s mine, though, she reminds herself, remembering how suffocating it was living at home, a minefield that Niall never learned how to navigate. 

Niall’s still on edge, though. Even halfway through college and a state away. It’s like—she can’t be alone enough, it just doesn’t feel like there’s enough time to make up for all the years she spent shoved in a tiny house in Georgia, with her ma and Greg and their shouting matches, and then Denise, and Theo. 

She felt like a stranger in the end. She feels like a stranger in her own home, most days, but at least she’s alone. No one telling her she’s selfish or weird or simultaneously too quiet and too loud. There’s just the clunk of her air conditioner, the one her landlord handed down to her, the dusty corners that she can’t bring herself to vacuum up, and the way she can still smell what her neighbor made for breakfast. 

Her mind’s still buzzing with Louis and the way she wriggles her way into Niall’s space, no regard for whether or not she’s wanted. Niall can’t decide if she wants to run away screaming or lean right back. It’s always like this. The thought of anyone moving in, breathing Niall’s air, touching her skin and like, expecting things from her makes ice cold panic race through her veins.

She shakes her head, wincing at the crackling in her neck. Soon. 

“Don’t do it,” she says out loud. “Do not fucking lay down.”

Predictably, no one answers. Perks of living alone, Niall thinks again, and then she’s dropping her backpack with a thud loud enough that her downstairs neighbor will probably complain, and stripping off her sweat-stained t-shirt, letting it fall to the floor, because there’s no one here to yell about it.

-

The downside of living alone, Niall realizes, is that there’s no one to keep her in line. Her cheek’s burning where it’s been pressed into the carpet, and she can tell it’s soon, feels the heavy ache in her bones. It’s dark now, moonlight streaming through the one window, air conditioner casting shadows on the floor. 

She drags herself up and into the bathroom. Brushes her teeth, stares herself down in the mirror. Her face looks bruised beneath the sunburn crawling across her nose. Her roots are inexcusable at this point, but she’s been thinking about letting her hair go dark for long enough that she might as well let it all the way go since she’s let it get this far. 

Niall remembers fighting with Greg over the bathroom at home, the anger she’d feel simmering in her veins when he’d leave his old socks in the corner and he’d use her hair brush, leave the toothpaste uncapped and all over the sink. 

Her bathroom’s a little messy, but it’s her mess, relatively controlled and contained. There’s no one here to bang on the door and tear her eyes away from her own reflection, so she leans in, counts the pores on her crooked nose. Traces the circles under her eyes, then steps back, looks at the shadows of her collarbones, thinks about how she likes it a little too much; the way she can see the faint outline of ribs underneath her skin.

The crack of her back pulls Niall out of it, away from the frayed edges of the sports bra she’s had since she was fifteen. 

She strips off her cutoffs on her way out of the bathroom and pulls on a pair of old gym shorts. They’re short enough that her mom wouldn’t let her out of the house if she were here, but she’s not, and Niall’s going to be rid of them soon enough, anyway.

Her worn out running shoes are sitting by the door. Dark blue and polka dotted with moonlight and too dusty and dirt covered to be inside, really. 

The stairs creak under her feet on the way out, and they sound just like her bones, tired and aching to collapse. The house is quiet, except for the sounds of it settling, and people’s air conditioners groaning and fans spinning at top speed. 

The heat hits her like a wall when she steps outside and trips her way down the front steps. It’s suffocating, but Niall breaks out into a jog anyway. 

Her eyes adjust slowly. Niall hates this part, the moments Before. When she’s still painfully all girl, her body tired and patchy, her lungs screaming as she tries to run into the humidity. 

Her knee aches every time her feet hit the ground. It’s a sharp reminder of the beginning. The beginning and the end, Niall thinks, trying to focus on her memories instead of the pain starting to shoot through her body. 

A genetic abnormality, some specialist in Dallas said, triggered by her knee finally giving in and requiring surgery. Niall’d never been that far west before, and for some reason the arid feeling of the air against her skin was more distracting than the way she turned into something else, something that scared people, when the full moon streamed over everything. 

She breaks out into a run when she feels it coming. The way her bones start to shift, and her skin stretches, making room for who she really is. 

It’s flashes of pain, and it grounds Niall and blinds her all at once, then everything’s sharp and magnified and Niall feels at home in her own body again.

-

The sun’s warm on her skin when she comes to, and Louis’ leaning over her, hair a dark curtain around her face, eyes endlessly blue. Niall’s skin feels prickly all over. 

“Louis,” she grits out, squeezing her eyes shut and wishing she could evaporate. “I’m naked.”

Louis just laughs and spreads out next to her, fully clothed right down to the holey Vans on her feet. 

“I can see that, Naddy,” she says, and reaches out to flick Niall’s arm. 

Niall brings her arms up across her chest. She can’t figure out if her skin’s warm from the sun or the blush of Louis seeing her naked.

“Just to be clear,” Niall starts, blinking against the sun, “I did say you couldn’t come.”

“You did say that,” Louis acknowledges, her voice low and scratchy from cigarettes and a long night.

“And yet you’re here, so?”

Louis huffs out a sigh, and Niall feels the anxiety start to spread, a tingle through her limbs, numbing her toes even as she wriggles them. She thinks about her clothes, hopefully not too far from here, neatly folded on an old tree at the edge of the field. 

“Brought your clothes. C’mon, Niall, I just showed up this morning. I have my own space, and I’m not a complete ass.”  
Niall’s clothes land on her face, smelling like sweat and dirt, and relief floods her body, relaxes all of her muscles and drains her energy.

“Thanks,” she says, her voice flat. 

She’s not sure if she should apologize, or if Louis is even offended. Niall’s good at reading people, generally, but Louis has always been a challenge, mercurial and lazy, half too close and half too far away. 

Louis has her eyes shut and her limbs stretched out, like she’s trying to make a snow angel, except there’s no snow here, just dust and half dead grass. Niall looks at her the whole thirty seconds it takes her to get dressed, haphazardly brushing the grass off her ass and the dirt off the soles of her feet. She looks oddly serene like this, eyelashes unfairly long and hair still pin straight, even after last night. 

Niall feels a surge of something she can’t pin down when she looks at Louis. There’s confusion and curiosity and want that comes and goes. Maybe some admiration, for the way Louis carries being a wolf so effortlessly.

“You can look now,” Niall says softly, brushing stray pieces of grass off of her arms. 

Her feet still feel dusty inside her socks. She should probably burn these sneakers, but they were expensive when she got them two years ago, and Niall’s never been good at letting things go. 

“Do you like it?”

Louis’ voice is clearer now, like she’s been thinking about what to say and let the words take shape in her mouth before she hit Niall with them.

“Like what,” Niall asks, purposefully obtuse, because she needs a second to collect an answer. 

“Shifting. Being a wolf,” Louis says flatly, and Niall can tell she’s only minorly annoyed. 

She doesn’t let herself sit back down. She knows where that leads--an hour spent under the sun, stretched out, her fingertips maybe touching Louis’. Weird, sun-lit intimacy that Niall doesn’t know what to do with. 

“I don’t hate it,” she says after a pause. 

It’s funny, saying it out loud, because Niall did hate it. For a long time she hated the cracks that it deepened, the way it made mom and Greg tip toe around her, like she was a bomb that was about to go off, when in her head, they were the bombs, always ticking furiously, counting down to the next explosion, and Niall never knew what would set them off. 

It’s different here. Being away from them. Niall thinks she probably needs a decade being alone, of learning out to stretch and take up space again before she can say that she likes it. Loves it, even. And it’s strange, just knowing someone else. Niall hasn’t decided yet if it’s a good thing or a bad thing, Louis’ presence in her life. 

“I loved it, when I was a kid,” Louis starts. She’s golden tan when Niall looks down at her, not an inch of sunburn in sight. “Like, after I broke my leg and everything changed, it was like--I was cool, y’know? I didn’t tell anyone, but it was something that was just mine, and I think I needed that.”

Niall’s heard the story a million times, even though she and Louis only met a year ago. How Louis broke her leg racing Lottie down the street on her two wheeler, the way her laces got caught in the chain and she toppled over, fractured her tibia and had to wear a hot pink cast for weeks. Niall even knows it was the only color they had, because Louis complains about it every time she tells the story. 

“And now?”

Louis blinks up at her, lifts her arm so she can shield her eyes from the sun. They don’t talk about the now, not really. It’s weird, when Niall stops to think about it, because Louis likes to talk about everything. 

“It’s looking up again,” she says, her lips curling into a smile that makes Niall’s stomach flip.

She doesn’t ask what it means.

-

Her apartment’s blissfully cool when she gets back, and Niall tries to memorize this moment, all the tension gone from her bones, her head buzzing a little less than usual. The brief moments of clarity that come right after the full moon. 

She strips once she’s inside the door, wincing at the streaks of dirt on her legs and feet. She cranks the shower all the way up, as hot as she can stand it. All she wants is a cold shower, but her muscles will thank her for this later. 

Dirt swirls down the drain. Niall traces over the lines of her body and tries not to hate it. 

-

They’ve fixed the air conditioner. Niall clocks it the second she walks in to stat, Louis already at the back of the room in her usual seat. Niall sighs with relief and winds her way back, sitting down next to Louis and pulling out her notebook.

“So,” Louis says, already leaning over. “The quiz tomorrow.”

Niall rolls her eyes and bites down on the smile threatening to spread across her face. 

“I thought the problem sets he posted on Blackboard were pretty helpful,” Niall says, looking up at Louis and trying to keep a straight face.

Louis just groans and lets her head fall and hit the desk, hair going everywhere. Niall swears she can smell her shampoo. 

“I need help.”

Louis’ voice is muffled and whiny and makes Niall shift in her seat.

“I can give you like, an hour. And no food.”

“Naddyyyy,” Louis whines, pulling her head up just so she can hit Niall with a full on pout. 

Niall’s stomach twists, but she does have a lot to get done. A physics lab and a lit review that she’s been putting off, and Louis’ll only be a distraction, hanging all over Niall’s bed and her space like she belongs there.

Do you want her to? Niall’s traitorous brain asks, and Niall ignores it. 

“An hour,” she repeats firmly, and Louis rolls her eyes, but she drops it. 

-

Louis’ late, predictably. Niall’s palms are sweaty even though the air conditioner’s turned all the way up. It’s deafening, and Niall wishes not for the first time that she could afford a place with nice, quiet central air. 

She jumps out of her skin when Louis knocks, wipes her hands on her cut offs before she goes over to let her in. She’s cleaned up in anticipation. She’s okay with her mess, but only when she’s alone. Being around other people puts her on edge. Louis puts her on edge, but she also like. Quiets the buzzing in Niall’s head. 

“I brought flaming hot cheetos,” Louis says, brandishing the bag in Niall’s face when she opens the door. 

“Louis,” Niall sighs, stepping aside so she can let her in, “I said one hour and no food.”

“You did,” Louis concedes, “But soccer ran long, and I had to stop and shower because I didn’t want to stink up your place, and I was hungry, so. I’ll share.”

She smiles at Niall, big enough that her eyes crinkle, and Niall’s a little fucked.

-

They get a surprising amount of work done before Louis starts to lose focus. The hour’s almost up, anyway, Niall realizes when she sees Louis doing more doodling in the margins than actual problem solving.

“Did you used to hate it?”

Niall’s blindsided by the question, at first. Not that she ever knows what Louis is thinking or what’ll come out of her mouth, but she wasn’t expecting this, exactly. 

She thinks about playing dumb. Getting up and asking what Louis’ talking about, and moving in the direction of the door in a not so subtle hint that it’s time for Louis to go.

She doesn’t.

“Yeah,” she says. 

Niall waits for Louis to ask her to elaborate, but she doesn’t. She stares at Niall from where she’s on her stomach, her face unreadable, then stretches up and gathers her laptop and notebook. 

“Thanks for the help,” she says, eyes soft. 

It makes Niall feel more naked than she did when she was actually naked in front of Louis. 

“Of course, we’re friends, I wasn’t gonna let you fail.”

“I know,” Louis says, cocking her hip and pausing in front of the door. “I’ll get you back for it, don’t worry.”

Niall’s shaking her head before Louis even finishes the sentence, but Louis reaches out and takes her wrist. It’s surprisingly gentle. Slow, like Louis’ afraid of spooking her. 

“When you’re ready,” Louis says, thumb tracing over the top of Niall’s hand, “we’ll do it together. And maybe you’ll start to love it.”

Niall waits for her body to kick into overdrive. For her mind to start racing and her palms to start sweating and her pulse to skyrocket.

None of it comes. It’s just the buzz of the air conditioner and the smell of Louis’ shampoo, and Louis’ skin on hers, light as a feather.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm [here](http://polaroidgirlfriend.tumblr.com) on tumblr.


End file.
